Lean leadership lessons from General Colin Powell - Problems are gold

A great post from Lean Pathways.

General Colin Powell says of leadership:

“The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help them or concluded that you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.”

In the article referred to by author Al Norval, General Powell goes on to say that in his opinion, given this test, the majority of CEOs would fail.

Norval makes a comparison between Powell and Lean's Mental Models:

"Problems are Gold, buried treasure to be unearthed. But in all too many organisations, problems aren’t treated as gold, rather they are treated as things to be swept under the carpet and left alone. People learn quickly to stop bringing problems to leaders. The funny thing is - the problems still exist."

Click here to read the full article.